Simbu paths to power : political change and cultural continuity in the Papua New Guinea Highlands

Abstract

This study examines the interaction between the politics of a Papua New Guinea Highlands society, the Simbu, and the colonially introduced state. It does so by analysing patterns of political competition in a study of dynamic change in four major stages, the precolonial, the colonial, decolonizing and post-colonial periods. In order to analyse this interaction, it seeks to answer the basic questions about politics - how people gain power and become politicians, how they maintain power once they have it, and whether the answers to these questions have differed in these time periods. In particular, it examines the extent to which indigenous social structures, ideologies and political techniques are used in the new state structures, and thus the degree to which the introduced institutions have been adapted by the Simbu. The interaction between indigenous, precolonial institutions and the state and its conventions are revealed by a study of the ideologies used in the Simbu political world. In the different political arenas which existed in the different time periods quite distinct talents have been displayed and appeals made. The Simbu ideologies of the solidarity of clans which have strong, hereditary leaders are used selectively according to the context. The aggressive battlefield leader of precolonial times was not appropriate in the enforced peace of the colonial era, but was revived in the insecure period of decolonization. Ideologies of the manipulation of wealth being the basis for prestige, power and influence were expanded upon in the colonial context, and have been further adapted in the post-colonial context to justify the use of massive financial and other resources in attempting to build personalised followings on a large scale. The ideology of the leader as a man of knowledge is also claimed by some. All these claims have at different times had some appeal and contributed to the search for bases of power, but no single model of Simbu leadership and society is applicable. The elements of this variety of political models can be found in the adaptivity of Simbu tradition. Simbu ideologies of solidarity are regularly expressed in bloc voting patterns by clans, tribes and sometimes whole language groups, and in the clan warfare which resumed in the late colonial period. The techniques and strategies of precolonial leadership, of the leader using resources from one sphere in another and gaining prestige from this interstitial role, are reinvented in many contexts in the contemporary state of PNG. These processes are demonstrated in numerous case studies of the transitional politics from precolonial Simbu to the contemporary period, with particular focus on the decade straddling the Independence of Papua New Guinea, and the creation of an elected provincial government. Political competition and voter responses are analysed in the context of three national and one provincial election, and the struggles for control of the area's coffee industry. Despite the different scale of the political arenas explored in different time periods, and the rapid increases in the political resources available, the political techniques and stategies of Simbu remained essentially the same* There are also continuities in political beliefs and the range of concepts found within Simbu's variegated political models. Despite the political changes, there has been continuity in Simbu's political culture. Simbu values have been used within the introduced state, just as resources from the state have been used within indigenous structures competition and conflicts. The process is thus one of interpenetration, with the state co-opted into Simbu political competition. Show more